Hijackers who fought a mid-air gunbattle with security guards over
southern Iran this week were among more than 20 members of four
families who had chartered a domestic airliner in a desperate bid to
flee the country.

The attempt failed when the pilot of the Ariatours Yak-40 anded in
the Iranian city of Bandar Abbas and jumped out.

The hijackers, now under arrest, were reported to have intended to
fly to Israel and on to the US.

Their identity and motives have not been disclosed, but it appears
the incident was an extreme example of the lengths to which some
Iranians - estimated at several thousand a month - are prepared to go
to leave their homeland, mostly out of economic considerations.
Living standards have steadily eroded since the revolution, and
official statistics show nearly a fifth of Iranians live beneath the
poverty line.

Western governments are concerned at the growing numbers of illegal
Iranian immigrants, but have no common policy on granting asylum or
enforcing repatriation.

Last year nearly 4,000 Iranian illegals sought asylum in the UK, the
third largest group after Chinese and Sri Lankans. The UK, an
official said, has a policy of not repatriating Iranians. The numbers
this year are rising.

Iran generally imposes no restrictions on its citizens leaving the
Islamic Republic.The challenge is how to get in to Europe.

Advertising themselves in Tehran as "travel agents", couriers in this
human traffic offer two solutions: buy a visa or embark on a
hazardous overland journey that begins in Bosnia or Turkey.

One agent offers Schengen visas valid for EU countries for $2,000
each, issued by the Greek embassy in Tehran. It is not clear whether
the visas are real or forged. A Tehran court last month put on trial
a woman engaged in faking Schengen visas, while the French embassy
recently discovered to its embarrassment that one of its staff was
selling the real thing.

Speaking from Kansas City, one young Iranian from the Christian
minority described how he flew on an organised "tour" to Sarajevo,
trekked through forests, crossed the Sava river into Croatia,
travelled through Slovenia and was met just inside Italy by
church-workers. He went on to Austria, where he registered as a
refugee and eventually ended up in the US.

Had he waited a little longer in Iran, that young Christian would
have had a far safer journey.

For the past year or so the Austrian embassy in Tehran has become the
main exit route for members of Iran's dwindling communities of Jews,
Armenian and Assyrian Christians, and even Zoroastrians - fire
worshippers whose religion dates from pre-Islamic times.

Austrian visas are granted to the minorities whose immigration into
the US, through Vienna, is organised and sponsored by religious
groups.

To the alarm of Jewish and Christian leaders in Iran, some of these
groups appear to have an active policy of emptying Iran of its
minorities.

More than 1,000 Jews are believed to be departing each year, leaving
behind a community of about 20,000. In the ancient city of Hamedan, a
place of pilgrimage for Jews around the world, only 35 are left.

"There are no religious reasons to leave Iran," says Morris Motamed,
the elected representative of the Jews in Iran's parliament. His
view is echoed by Leon Davidian, his Armenian counterpart, who says a
rising trend in Armenian migration, mainly to the US, is most
worrying.

Ironically, the rush to leave Iran comes at a time of more religious
and social tolerance fostered by Mohammad Khatami, the reformist
president.

Joining the flow of illegals is a tide of legal immigration, mainly
to the US, Canada and Australia, by Iran's professional elite.

Bemoaning the brain drain, the Tehran Times commented in an editorial
this week: "We must reverse this trend. Only then can we claim that
our government has been successful. And only then can Iranians live
in their own home and not feel alienated."